Old story back......Looking forward to it!!!!

Lets go Cadel!!!!!

Yay, a blast from the past raises its head once again

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 8: Chiete - L'Aquila

Evans, Boasson Hagen, Uran, Pellizotti, Sulzberger, Efimkin, Lloyd, Chtioui, Sabatini

The early mountains did not go to plan for Cadel, so it is time to look elsewhere for opportunities.



3km uphill at the end of the stage is a good place to start, and Uran launches a move with Evans in tow.



Chance of a 2nd consecutive stage win for the Colombian? Not with the Maglia Rosa Di Luca following. It has to be 2nd and 3rd for the DFL duo.



A chance for Di Luca to extend his lead. 3rd overall Cataldo made the group, as did 12th overall Kirchen - but the only other rider was a 3rd for DFL, Boasson Hagen picking up some valuable points. A minute's gain for Evans on many of his rivals should be helpful though!

1	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	3h38'29
2	Rigoberto Urán	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
3	Cadel Evans	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
4	Kim Kirchen	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	s.t.
5	Dario Cataldo	GEROLSTEINER	s.t.
6	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
7	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	+ 36
8	Mauricio Soler	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	+ 44
9	Jurgen Van den Broeck	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	+ 59
10	Maxim Iglinskiy	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	s.t.

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 9: L'Aquila - Giulianova

A flat stage is next, but with Sulzberger not feeling up to leadout duties, Boasson Hagen had to jump on the train of Lampre.



Forero is their sprinter, but a well positioned EBH is hard to beat.



It is a 4th Giro stage win for him with closest Points jersey rival Marcato struggling, and replaced in 2nd by Capecchi.

1	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	4h10'13
2	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	s.t.
3	Juan Pablo Forero	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	s.t.
4	Ersilio Calogero	TEAM MILRAM	s.t.
5	Francesco Gavazzi	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	s.t.
8	Marco Marcato	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	s.t.

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 10: Giulianova ITT

A 50km up and down time trial would really force some gaps, and a chance for Evans to make up some positions.



He rode to 7th on the stage - some 2 minutes behind the stage winner Julian Rodas. It had been a poor start to the race for the Colombian stage racer, but suddenly he leaps up from 46th to 7th in GC - one ahead of Evans in his new position of 8th.



Change at the top of the standings too, as Popovych put enough time into Di Luca to take the lead.

1	Julián Rodas	TEAM ASTANA	1h13'43
2	Yaroslav Popovych	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	+ 19
3	Edwin Orozco	BARLOWORLD	+ 1'31
4	Jurgen Van den Broeck	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	+ 1'35
5	Stefan Schumacher	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 1'42
6	Riccardo Riccò	BARLOWORLD	+ 2'11
7	Cadel Evans	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 2'16
8	Bernhard Kohl	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 2'20
9	Benoît Vaugrenard	T-MOBILE TEAM	+ 2'23
10	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	+ 2'29

GC Update

1	Yaroslav Popovych	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	40h16'58
2	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	+ 45
3	Riccardo Riccò	BARLOWORLD	+ 2'17
4	Damiano Cunego	TEAM ASTANA	+ 2'47
5	Jurgen Van den Broeck	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	+ 2'49
6	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 3'14
7	Julián Rodas	TEAM ASTANA	+ 3'29
8	Cadel Evans	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 3'47
9	Mauricio Soler	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	+ 4'00
10	Dario Cataldo	GEROLSTEINER	s.t.
11	Rigoberto Urán	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 4'17
12	Stefano Barberi	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	+ 4'45
13	Kim Kirchen	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	+ 4'51
14	Edwin Orozco	BARLOWORLD	+ 5'00
15	Stefan Schumacher	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 5'11
16	Maxim Iglinskiy	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	+ 5'46
17	Bernhard Kohl	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 5'49
18	Mauricio Ortega	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 5'50
19	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	+ 5'56
20	Ondrej Sosenka	UNIBET.COM	+ 6'25
21	Juanjo Cobo	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 6'26
22	Rinaldo Nocentini	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	+ 6'41
23	Franco Pellizotti	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 6'42
24	Rafaâ Chtioui	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 7'00
25	Sergio Pardilla	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 7'01

Good stage win for Eddy Bos

That's what he is good at!

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 11: Ancone - Faenza

Evans, Boasson Hagen, Uran, Pellizotti, Sulzberger, Efimkin, Lloyd, Chtioui, Sabatini

A completely flat stage, so we want a sprint! A break of 8 went away today and proved particularly stubborn to catch.

10 minute lead, 94km to go: domestiques Chtioui, Sabatini and Lloyd on the front.



55km to go, 7 minute lead. Climbing domestique Efimkin and 11th overall Uran have had to take over.



46km to go, 6 minute lead. Starting to get desperate now, we have to commit our 6th rider to the chase: Sulzberger. No sense having a leadout man if we don't get a sprint.



30km to go, 5 minute lead. We are done! But finally other teams step forward: Milram and Quickstep.



CSC, Credit Agricole and Wiesenhof also join in later. A price of our success is having had to do the hard graft early on and all 6 who got involved in the chasing would get dropped.

But it was worth it! Break caught with 5km to go.



EBH has to do it all himself for us in the finish, but that doesn't usually stop him. He picks the wheel of Capecchi.



It was well chosen, but getting out of that wheel was the hard part! Capecchi wins the stage, and after all that work, we only get a 2nd place.

1	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	3h59'58
2	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
3	Manuel Cardoso	GEROLSTEINER	s.t.
4	Juan José Haedo	TEAM CSC	s.t.
5	Ersilio Calogero	TEAM MILRAM	s.t.
6	Marco Marcato	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	s.t.
7	Juan Pablo Forero	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	s.t.
8	Paride Grillo	CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE	s.t.
9	Allan Davis	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	s.t.
10	Antonio Aldegani	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	s.t.

Damnit.


*goes looking for Auber 93...*

Well this is a blast from the past! Still rocking the extreme wins too.

Can't have one without the other

Extreme wins were always a little easier for DFL than Auber though!

Haha I was just thinking "wait, those wins come way too easy now...oh shit, I forgot the uncompetitive squad story was Auber "



But I second this, both back would be like a second coming of the old glorious days.
Even this alone is making me happy.

Indeed nice to see this back. I wasn't registered (most of) at the time this story was in its best days, but I am regulary reading old stories so I am familiar with what is/was happening here.

Some good results lately. I especially like the one on Stage 8 where 3 DFL guys finished in Top 6, which is quite impressive!

This is from way before my time, but it's cool to see something this retro alive!

And those graphics

I like the snow textures

Another good stage from Boasson Hagen

That aint snow..... Had problems with his gfx card iirc.


Anyway, love that this is back, makes me want to play the older games again. I have the PPDB for 06 but I forget what to do to advance on 31/03 and all the other days each year.

Indeed, Giro, Catalunya, Dauphine and Suisse will all have this lovely scenery due to the graphics cards issues I had at the time they were played, a few years ago. The colour will return after that!

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 12: Faenza - Ferrare

Evans, Boasson Hagen, Uran, Pellizotti, Sulzberger, Efimkin, Lloyd, Chtioui, Sabatini

Another all flat stage, and after yesterday, we don't feel like burning the whole team out again. Sabatini joins the 12 man break.



They will win the stage by a distance.

Although a cobbles specialist, Sabatini does have a good sprint on him if it comes to that. But unfortunately it doesn't, Markus Eichler broke clear in the closing stages to take the win for Unibet.



2nd is still a very good result for our Italian!

1	Markus Eichler	UNIBET.COM	4h14'05
2	Fabio Sabatini	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 29
3	Diego Caccia	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	s.t.
4	Leon Van Bon	TEAM CSC	s.t.
5	Mirko Celestino	RABOBANK	s.t.
6	Pieter Jacobs	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	s.t.
7	Klaas Sys	LIQUIGAS	s.t.
8	Freddie Breck	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	+ 1'24
9	Baoqing Song	FRANÇAISE DES JEUX	s.t.
10	Sisto Artoni	SERRAMENTI PVC DIQUIGIOVANNI - SELLE ITALIA	s.t.

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 13: Rovigo - Marostica

3rd all flat stage in a row, and this time only a 2 man breakaway, hurrah!

Bizarre AI antics followed though after an early intermediate sprint. EBH won the peloton battle for 3rd, but the other sprinters just kept on going - Forero, Marcato, Haedo, Gavazzi, Davis, Cardoso, Calogero and Grillo all spending a significant portion of the stage off the front of the peloton.



They will struggle come the actual finish, although Gavazzi is still keen for it and decides to lead out with 2km to go. EBH is right there, of course. Capecchi could be the key rival here as he did not get involved in the shenanigans, but he isn't well placed at all.



1km to go, time to move!



EBH leads the way but in a change of role, that is Sulzberger on his wheel. Possible 1-2 on the cards here!



Win number 5 for Eddy? Nope! He sits up just before the line, allowing Wes Sulzberger to come through and take his maiden Grand Tour stage win!

1	Wes Sulzberger	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	2h56'01
2	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
3	Francesco Gavazzi	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	s.t.
4	Antonio Aldegani	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	s.t.
5	Manuel Cardoso	GEROLSTEINER	s.t.
6	Pieter Riis Andersen	TEAM CSC	s.t.
7	Alberto Ongarato	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	s.t.
8	Martin Pedersen	UNIBET.COM	s.t.
9	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	s.t.
10	Ersilio Calogero	TEAM MILRAM	s.t.

After so much consecutive flat riding, the good news is that tomorrow brings Mountains!



GC Update

1	Yaroslav Popovych	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	51h34'26
2	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	+ 45
3	Riccardo Riccò	BARLOWORLD	+ 2'17
4	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 2'20
5	Damiano Cunego	TEAM ASTANA	+ 2'47
6	Jurgen Van den Broeck	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	+ 2'49
7	Julián Rodas	TEAM ASTANA	+ 3'29
8	Cadel Evans	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 3'47
9	Dario Cataldo	GEROLSTEINER	+ 4'00
10	Mauricio Soler	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	s.t.
11	Stefano Barberi	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	+ 4'45
12	Kim Kirchen	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	+ 4'51
13	Edwin Orozco	BARLOWORLD	+ 5'00
14	Stefan Schumacher	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 5'11
15	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	+ 5'36
16	Maxim Iglinskiy	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	+ 5'46
17	Bernhard Kohl	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 5'49
18	Mauricio Ortega	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 5'50
19	Ondrej Sosenka	UNIBET.COM	+ 6'25
20	Juanjo Cobo	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 6'26
21	Rinaldo Nocentini	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	+ 6'41
22	Franco Pellizotti	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 6'42
23	Sergio Pardilla	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 7'01
24	Evgeni Petrov	TEAM CSC	+ 7'09
25	Pieter Weening	RABOBANK	+ 7'30

Points Update

1	Edvald Boasson Hagen	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	214
2	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	141
3	Marco Marcato	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	118
4	Ersilio Calogero	TEAM MILRAM	106
5	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	99
6	Wes Sulzberger	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	78
7	Francesco Gavazzi	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	68
8	Riccardo Riccò	BARLOWORLD	65
9	Juan Pablo Forero	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	60
10	Manuel Cardoso	GEROLSTEINER	58

Beautiful result for the DFL Boys

The team are producing some good stage finishes of late

Can't beat it when there is more updates of DFL and some good results on the flat stages hopefully Cadel can follow up in the mountains.

Has the real Giro taught you nothing about Cadel's climbing abilities?

Giro d'Italia, 2010 Stage 14: Marostica - Passo Duran

Evans, Boasson Hagen, Uran, Pellizotti, Sulzberger, Efimkin, Lloyd, Chtioui, Sabatini



Two weeks into this race and still a long way from determining the outcome, but that starts to change from Stage 14.

Rigoberto Uran went with the breakaway. He won the KoM jersey at last year's Tour so will now aim for the same here. He wins the first two climbs to start his points tally.



Already on that 2nd climb of three the attacks began. Evans felt obliged to follow, but clearly didnt have the legs that others did.



Cunego and Di Luca were the strongest, and the Italian duo pressed on a bid to distance race leader Popovych. By the foot of the final climb, the Passo Duran, they had caught up with Uran.



Popovych was gradually closing what had been a 1 minute's gap to them, with help from Soler.

More attacks kicked off, so Evans tried again



But he found himself in the 3rd group on the road, without much help from companions Barberi and Ortega.



Up front Di Luca and Cunego paid for their earlier efforts by eventually losing time to Popovych. The stage win went to Juan Mauricio Soler, while the Barloworld rider in 2nd was fellow Colombian Orozco - surprisingly ahead of his team leader Ricco!



Evans finished 11th, 3 minutes down. He just can't compete with the other climbers here and is already 3 minutes outside of even 5th in GC.

1	Mauricio Soler	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	4h20'06
2	Edwin Orozco	BARLOWORLD	s.t.
3	Yaroslav Popovych	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	s.t.
4	Damiano Cunego	TEAM ASTANA	+ 19
5	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	s.t.
6	Riccardo Riccò	BARLOWORLD	+ 1'22
7	Jurgen Van den Broeck	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	s.t.
8	Kim Kirchen	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	s.t.
9	Stefano Barberi	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	+ 2'49
10	Mauricio Ortega	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	s.t.
11	Cadel Evans	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 2'59
12	Julián Rodas	TEAM ASTANA	+ 4'03
13	Emanuele Sella	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	+ 4'11
14	Saul Raisin	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	s.t.
15	Carlos Sastre	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	s.t.
16	Alexander Efimkin	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
17	Franco Pellizotti	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	s.t.
18	Sandy Casar	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	s.t.
19	Maxim Iglinskiy	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	s.t.
20	Matías Médici	SERRAMENTI PVC DIQUIGIOVANNI - SELLE ITALIA	s.t.

GC

1	Yaroslav Popovych	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	55h54'24
2	Danilo Di Luca	T-MOBILE TEAM	+ 1'12
3	Damiano Cunego	TEAM ASTANA	+ 3'14
4	Riccardo Riccò	BARLOWORLD	+ 3'47
5	Mauricio Soler	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	+ 3'48
6	Jurgen Van den Broeck	PREDICTOR - LOTTO	+ 4'19
7	Edwin Orozco	BARLOWORLD	+ 4'56
8	Kim Kirchen	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	+ 6'21
9	Cadel Evans	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 6'54
10	Julián Rodas	TEAM ASTANA	+ 7'40
11	Stefano Barberi	QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC	+ 7'42
12	Dario Cataldo	GEROLSTEINER	+ 8'19
13	Mauricio Ortega	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 8'47
14	Stefan Schumacher	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 9'30
15	Eros Capecchi	LIQUIGAS	+ 9'55
16	Maxim Iglinskiy	CRÉDIT AGRICOLE	+ 10'05
17	Bernhard Kohl	AG2R PRÉVOYANCE	+ 10'08
18	Juanjo Cobo	SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR	+ 10'45
19	Rinaldo Nocentini	CAISSE D'EPARGNE	+ 11'00
20	Franco Pellizotti	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	+ 11'01

KoM

1	Yaroslav Popovych	LAMPRE - FONDITAL	26
2	Damiano Cunego	TEAM ASTANA	22
3	Rigoberto Urán	DFL - CYCLINGNEWS - LITESPEED	20
4	Mauricio Soler	DISCOVERY CHANNEL	20
5	Edwin Orozco	BARLOWORLD	15

SN, those graphics! I don't remember PCM 2007 beeing messed up in terms of graphics

Cadel still has a chance of climbing places.

all those riders I've never heard off